Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/2.8, 1/35 sec, ISO800 “Ink Change” Cedar Park, 2020
Today I changed up the lineup of my fountain pens a bit. I still love my Lamy Safari with broad nib, but have been enjoying the Pilot F nib more lately. Although I have several cheap Jinhao pens, only the Lamy and my Pilots have ink in them now, so maybe it’s time to pare down the collection and give the Jinhaos away.
Here’s my current lineup:
Lamy Safari (broad) / Iroshizuku Ama-Iro – The broad nib lets me see bright blue ink in all of its glory. Ama-Iro is my favorite ink that I’ll never get tired of.
Pilot Metropolitan (F) / Namiki Blue/Black – A general-purpose set-up great for basic writing. I have a bottle of Noodler’s Bulletproof Black, but that ink takes a long time to fully dry, and I end up with a lot of smears.
Although I have 4 colors, I like to limit a page to just 2 or 3 if I can. Any of them work well as a 3-color set, but 4 on a page will reveal a clashing pair, in my eyes. It may seem like a silly thing to mention, but I think it’s fun to think about these little things!
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/4, 1/125 sec, ISO5000 “Kuru Toga” Cedar Park, 2019
こんばんは。How’s it going?
Koa was moving his pens and pencils to a new pencil bag and decided that he didn’t want his Kuru Toga pencils anymore. He prefers writing with wooden pencils over mechanical (plus the mechanical pencils poke holes in the pencil bag) so he gave me the Kuru Togas. Score!
The Kuru Toga pencils are so cool because the lead automatically rotates a tiny bit every time you lift the pencil from the page. That way, the lead maintains a a consistent edge. It’s kind of amazing how it works, and also how they actually thought it was a worthwhile feature to develop. Innovation!
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/4, 1/125 sec, ISO1250 “Sketch and Things” Cedar Park, 2019
こんばんは。
Today’s photo is of the daily sketch I made, with my Timex Weekender watch and a few other items for fun. I wore this watch today because I saw an online friend’s Instagram post and it looked so nice that I was inspired! You know how you watch a movie where the characters are drinking, and it makes you want a drink, or they’re smoking and you think a cigarette might be nice? I guess that same sort of thing came over me. 😆
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/3.6, 1/100 sec, ISO640 “Binder Ingredients” Cedar Park, 2018
こんばんは。How’s it going?
So this weekend I have gotten closer to figuring out the type of binder solution that will work for me. Last year I really got into my Traveler’s Company Passport-size Notebook, but I’ve found that it’s just too small for me. I think the regular size Traveler’s Notebook is also a bit too narrow. The notebook inserts don’t lie flat enough for me to write or draw in comfortably.
Those shortcomings led me to the A5 Binder. First of all, the A5 size is perfect for my sketching and note-taking. I have a bunch of A5-sized notebooks, so I know that these aren’t too small, but I also know that A4 or letter-sized is just too big for me. It would take a lot of writing/drawing to fill one page so that would keep me from starting on a new page. Also, the A5 size binder fits nicely into my messenger bag.
Secondly, the 20-ring binder is good because I can use loose-leaf paper. The advantage of this is that the paper lays flat for easy writing/drawing, or I can even take the paper out of the binder and work on it by itself, then add it back into the binder. And the fact that I can add/remove/reorder pages gives me a lot of freedom!
I actually have a bunch of A5 bound notebooks but I don’t really use them. The reason is that I feel like once I start a new notebook, I have to finish it before moving on to the next one, and also I don’t want to mess up a page and thus “ruin” the whole notebook. I know it’s kind of dumb, but still, it’s holding me back. I have about 10 notebooks sitting on the shelf! But with the loose-leaf paper, that burden is lifted. If I mess up a page, I just throw it away, and no one (me) will ever know it existed.
Another advantage of the binder is that I can mix and match different kinds of paper. For instance, I have graph paper, blank paper, and lined paper all in the single binder. The only things that I wish I had were dot-grid pages and watercolor pages. But the good news is that I should have these two fixed soon, though, because I am planning on printing dot grids on some of my plain paper, and in order to add watercolor pages, I’ve ordered a 20-hole punch. That should give me the freedom to add not only watercolor paper but pretty much any kind of paper (after trimming to A5 size).
One thing I’ve been doing is putting my sketches into the binder. Since I am using drawing paper from my sketchbook, I’ve just been cutting those out and taping them onto blank pages using washi tape. To make a little cleaner, I purchased a Tombow Adhesive Tape tool. But I think since I will have the 20-hole punch soon, it might be easier just to trim the sketchbook page and then hole-punch it.
Lastly, I purchased a clear pen case that also goes into the binder. I’ll probably keep some cash, Instax photos, or other fun stuff in there.
If you already use a loose-leaf type planner or binder, all this might be old hat to you. But for me, I am loving my new “discovery”. It’s great!
So that’s the current state of my everyday notebook/binder. I’m not sure what to do with the Traveler’s Notebook yet, but I guess I’ll figure out an alternate use for it.
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/2.8, 1/100 sec, ISO640 “Triptych” Cedar Park, 2018
こんばんは。How’s it going?
I bought some new paper for my notebook today. It’s a 100-sheet pack of Maruman A5 Plain Paper which I planned to use as a base for taping sketches on top of. But to my pleasant surprise, the smooth, white paper is really nice to sketch on. It erases well (VERY important for me) and it takes ink nicely too! I’m very happy with it. 😄
